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Tuesday, July 7, 2015

Learn to draw with Charcoal

Hi Everyone. I am Pooja Amit

. Today I am going to show you how I draw with charcoal! But before I begin, here is a little something about me.

I am an Engineer by profession but an artist at heart!

My
interest in art comes because of my
mother, Mrs. Nalini Shankar. She's an
artist and I have spent all my childhood
looking at her teach children how to
draw & paint. Although I have no
formal education in art, her lessons
were more than enough to pull me into
this field. Another great inspiration
for me was my visit to the Louvre
museum while I was studying in Paris.
I also
take orders
for paintings
and run an
online art gallery
featuring my
works.

When Itsy Bitsy approached me to do a series of tutorials on how to use different drawing and painting mediums, I was very excited. They do carry a wide range of art supplies. Today I am going to show you how to use draw with Charcoal. Charcoal is usually burnt organic material like wood.
Typically it is used on paper to bring out a more dramatic effect as
compared to the graphite pencils. This is achieved due to the dark black shades
brought out by using charcoal.

Charcoal for art usage is available in the market in
different forms- Compressed charcoal like pencils, softer charcoal called vine
charcoal sticks ,uncompressed form like stumping powder and pigmented
charcoal(white and other colours).

Below I have listed the materials I have
used in my project –

Paper – I have used the MontMarte A3 size sketchbook suitable for pencil/charcoal sketches. Its important to use a soft
textured paper because if the paper is too smooth, the charcoal wont stick and
if the paper is too textured, you have a hard time bringing out the details.

Vine charcoal – This is uncompressed charcoal in
the form of sticks. Also called Willow charcoal. I’m using these sticks instead
of charcoal stumping powder.

Charcoal pencils – This is compressed charcoal
in the form of a pencil. It comes in soft, medium and hard densities. Soft
pencils give darker gradations whereas hard ones give lighter gradations.

Kneadable/Hard Erasers – Kneadable erasers are
soft, pliable erasers that can be squeezed to any shape to erase off tricky
areas. Harder erasers are good for erasing off charcoal while revealing
highlights.

Blending Stumps – Used for blending smaller
detailed areas. This comes in different sizes, so choose the appropriate one
based on the blending area.

Paper Towel/ Tissue paper – for blending larger
areas

Fixative spray (optional)-Spray fix helps to
protect a drawing once it's finished by preventing smearing. It
"fixes" or sets the media onto the paper.

To begin with, sketch the outline of your picture using a
graphite HB pencil. Make sure the sketch is light and do not apply more
pressure on the surface , because charcoal doesn’t stick on the pencil
outlines. I have sketched a heritage sculpture of Lord Buddha, you can choose any
picture in black’n’ white for your initial sketches, as the shades are clearly
defined.

Once you are happy with your sketch, start with using vine
charcoal to smudge over the surface, use it over and over again if you want a
darker shade. Use a cotton swab or a
paper napkin to smudge larger surfaces. Make sure to keep a paper under your
palm to avoid rubbing off the charcoal.

After you have completed the shading of the face, for very
dark and smooth gradation, use the blending sticks. Scrape off the vine
charcoal to use the powder , roll the stick on the powder and then use it on
the paper as shown in the image. The advantage of using the stick is the clear
definition that can be achieved.

After the basic shading of the picture, to highlight the
dark areas, use the charcoal pencils. In the sample pic, I have used the
pencils to emphasize the facial features and hair.

To complete the sketch, use the vine charcoal sticks to
smudge and prepare your background to a light/dark grey based on the picture
you are drawing. Darken the background areas where the light is more on the
face and keep the background light where the face is dark. This kind of
contrast makes the completed sketch more visually appealing.

Charcoal Paintings usually give the paintings realistic and dramatic effect and the paintings made using charcoal are unique because charcoal has an exclusive texture and thus considered to be one of the versatile medium of art since ages. You can buy some amazing masterpiece of Charcoal Painting Online at Reenart Gallery.So getting these stunning Charcoal Paintings Online has now become easy with Reenart Gallery as it provides online services all around Australia. One more thing about Charcoal Paintings is that these original paintings made using charcoal are more inspiring and you can find some of these inspirational charcoal paintings online that looks so stunning at Reenart Gallery.Charcoal Painting is one of the unique form of painting and the one that is not easily available like the other types of paintings. This type of painting was widely used in the age of Renaissance but only few paintings survived because of the particles flaking out of the canvas. Charcoal art is known since ages and is also a difficult type of art and that difficulty makes it an amazing art work. But this painting of this art form looks so innovating even today. Buying charcoal paintings online has now become easy as you can find some mesmerizing charcoal art work online at Reenart Gallery, a pioneer online art gallery in Australia.